


Reflections of an Elf

by SemperAeternumQue



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Feels, Fluff, Foreshadowing, Forests, Gen, I just can't write Turin I'm sorry, I'm Sorry, Little Turin, Melian's Girdle, Mortality, Short, i tried okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 04:07:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18984946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SemperAeternumQue/pseuds/SemperAeternumQue
Summary: Beleg watches a young Turin run through the woods of Doriath and reflects.





	Reflections of an Elf

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CrystalNavy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrystalNavy/gifts).



> I'm really sorry, CrystalNavy, I tried really hard to make this good but I feel like I failed fairly epically. Hey, at least I wrote it? I mean, you have to give me at least little credit for managing it during finals week. I promise to write a longer and better fic about another one of your favorites after finals. :)
> 
> Have some fluff and slight dark foreshadowing, y'all.

Little Turin trips through the forest ahead of Beleg, hair messy and ruffled from all the running.

It is a beautiful spring day in Doriath, and the young human loves to run in the forest. He is supposed to be in lessons, but Beleg can never resist his cute face as he asks ‘please, can I skip just today?’ in his most pleading tone. Beleg knows that if he denies Turin, the boy will simply sneak away, so Beleg comes with him for safety.

The Girdle keeps Morgoth’s creatures outside, but a clumsy young boy can still get into plenty of trouble in a forest as big as Doriath. And thus Beleg follows behind, watching out for Turin’s safety as he has always done.

He finds himself remarkably attached to the young mortal already, and he does not wish for anything bad to happen to him. Anything not predetermined by the fate of men to pass beyond the world, he supposes.

Growing up in Doriath, Beleg never saw much death. The Girdle keeps them safe, and the few deaths that happened were usually hunting accidents or something of the sort.

Beleg didn’t see death on a large scale until the Battle of Unnumbered Tears. That was the most horrifying thing he ever went through, and he did not come out of the other side the same as when he entered.

Recently, the foul creatures of Morgoth have been braver about testing the Girdle, and so the borders are more active. There is more fighting. More death.

Yes, Beleg has seen death. Yet death is never an inevitability for the Eldar the way it is for the Edain, and part of Beleg still struggles to comprehend that Turin will die no matter what Beleg does.

Mortality is not something the elven archer has much experience with, and it is still strange to think of death as inevitable rather than avoidable. Elves can die, that is for certain. But their deaths can be avoided, and rarely do elves die simply by living long enough. The very oldest fade, sometimes, but it is not unavoidable the way mortal death is.

Turin trips over a log, and Beleg hurries to help him up, pushing aside his heavy thoughts. The mortal brushes off his fussing, but Beleg cannot help but worry.

Maybe he will lose Turin one day, if not to Morgoth’s creatures or the boy’s own recklessness then to the ravages of time, but he resolves for that day to be as far away as it possibly can. If he has to follow Turin to Angband and back, he will. 

**Finis**


End file.
